The time on my phone read 3:45am. I still hadn’t slept. The idea of talking to Pete and confronting him about who I was, what he had said, it was too much to be able to just shut off my brain and sleep.

I needed to go back where I did my best thinking. The streets. I grabbed a pencil and piece of paper from the little notepad on the fridge door that is clearly meant for making grocery lists.

Jen,

Going out to clear my mind. I have my phone. I’ll be back. I promise.

~Kat

==========

Maybe taking a walk through the city at 4am isn’t the smartest idea. I obviously know the worst parts to avoid, and I can stick to the parts that are already starting to open up to cater to morning people. Doesn’t make it any less uncanny though. I always tried to sleep past the initial morning wakeup period for the city, if I could. It’s just weird to see this huge bustling city barely populated, with only the most dedicated of business owners out and about sweeping the sidewalks in front of their shops or standing inside locked storefronts, counting cash into registers.

I walk with my thoughts, hands shoved deep into the pockets of the coat Jen got me on one of our shopping trips. It’s warm, even if it is a little girly. Black with a pink fake fur fringe around the collar. I guess it could be worse. Alright, fine - I like it.

Even though I’m wearing a pair of my new jeans instead of the shorts I would otherwise be wearing if I was still like I was a week ago, I swear the wind cuts through me more easily. I’m glad I left my hair up though. If it was hanging loose it would be whipping all over in the morning wind. I have enough little wispy fly-aways already, tickling my ears and catching the corners of my mouth.

A clock on the side of a local shop tells me it’s closing in on 8am. Have I really been walking around for 4 hours? Other people have started joining me on the sidewalks. Morning joggers, people glumly obligated to work weekends, and of course the other occasional drifting homeless folks like mys— well… I guess like myself if I choose to be.

I don’t want to be, though. I want to stay with Jen.

A guy who I guess is probably in his early 20s undresses me with his eyes as I pass. I roll my eyes in response and keep going. Jerk. It’s not the first time I’ve noticed it happen, of course, but he was being really blatant about it.

Of course, I’m also getting a lot of weird looks because of my ears and tail. Not every day you see a girl with cat ears or a cat tail… at least not outside of a cosplay convention.

I’m not sure how I came to be here, but I’m standing in front of the café I always used to get breakfast at. There’s a very sparse number of customers inside to get their coffee fix. I recognize one of them, sitting by the window looking out with his eyes focused on the edge of the building - he has a clear view of the alleyway entrance. Pete.

I guess I can’t run from this anymore. I need to talk to him. He needs to know. He needs to know that I know what he said about me. I need to know how he feels about me, for real. I take a deep breath and - 

“Morning!” an older gentleman says on his way out the door, holding it for me. He does a little bit of a double take at my ears and tail, but says nothing else.

“Oh, thanks… Good morning!” I say awkwardly, slipping in through the door to the warmth of the café interior. I see him shake his head slightly and smile as he walks towards his car. He’s probably thinking ‘oh those crazy kids and their early Halloween costumes’ or something. Hehehe…

Pete barely seems to notice me at first when I come in, nursing his cup of coffee (I assume it’s coffee, at least) and a breakfast sandwich. He only really takes note when I stand next to his table.

“Hey. This seat taken?” I gesture at the stool across from him.

“Huh?” It takes a moment, but he shakes his head. “Oh, Kat. Hey… nope, seat’s open. I didn’t know you came here.” He seems uneasy. I don’t blame him based on his recent interactions with me - even though he incited the hostility himself. He’s lucky I didn’t scratch him for pulling my tail. 

“Oh, yeah. Every morning for years,” I say evenly as I sink on to the stool.

“Really? I must always miss you.” He raises a brow and sips his coffee. 

This is it. Now or never. Come on, Kat. You can do this. “...Nope.” I shake my head. “We actually ate together.”

He looks confused for a moment. Good. I can see him trying to work it out. “...Huh?” He blinks several times.

“Not inside. Usually around the back.” I motion at the alleyway he’d been watching.

“Wait, what?” He’s still not getting it. Maybe he’s not as smart as I used to think he was.

“I looked a little different,” I say, making the greatest understatement of the year.

The gears finally seem to mesh. I’m kinda surprised it took that long. It’s not like my nicknames are even that different. He had the pieces. Definitely not as smart as I used to think.

“Wait. Kit?” His eyes go wide and he nearly drops his coffee. If it hadn’t already been partially resting on the table, he probably would have.

I shrug. “It’s Kat now, but yeah. Hi Pete.” 

His mouth flaps open and closed like a fish for a few seconds. “B-but you… you’re a… were you before…? Did I just never notice? But no, wait… that’s right, you’re the regen girl… so that means…”

I sit and let him finally run through the mouse maze, putting together all the information he should have put together ages ago.

“Holy crap I’m so happy you’re okay! I hadn’t seen you all week so I was worri—”

“Worried that your charity case might have gotten lost before I could make you look good on college applications?” I asked, throwing his own words back at him.

He winced. “I promise I was just saying that to get them to lay off! They always like to tease me about hanging out with a home--” He tried to cut himself off, but failed.

“A what, Pete? A homeless kid?” I folded my hands on the table between us. 

He looked guilty and nodded. “Y-yeah…”

“I thought I could trust you, Pete. I had… I had feelings for you. Was anything about us real, Pete? Or was I always just a project to you?” My temper was starting to rise. I wanted to be calm about this. I don’t know if I can stay that way.

“Well, I mean… not always! At first I really did just want to help and hang out with you! Then I told my parents and they explained the whole ‘charity work looking good’ thing and I just thought… well, I mean, if doing something I was already going to do anyway made me look good too, why not?”

“So did you keep hanging around because you wanted to, or because it looked good for you?” I demanded, feeling my claws scraping on the tabletop as my hands tensed.

“I kept hanging out with you because I had a crush on you!” Pete blurted out. A moment later he seemed to realize what he’d said, and clamped a hand over his mouth.

“You…  had a crush on me?” The anger that had been building seemed to flow away.

Pete nodded slowly. “I… I did, I’m sorry I didn’t say anything sooner. I was just afraid.”

“What about now?” I asked, my ears folding down in embarrassment.

“I… sorry, Kat. I uh. I don’t like girls.” Pete sighed, looking down at his coffee.

Of course… I could have had a chance if I had stayed a boy. But I wasn’t a boy, not right now… maybe never again. 

“Look, we can still be friends though, right? I mean you’re off the streets now, right? We could just hang out like normal.”

Friends… could I still be friends with him? I had felt so many confusing feelings for him as a boy. Then everything that had happened after what he had said at lunch… was he worth another chance at being a friend? He was a guy, after all…

But Ben was a guy too, and he didn’t seem bad. Besides, Cassie had been right. I couldn’t keep hiding from everything that happened. I needed to clear the air with him.

“Yeah, I guess we can try to still be friends,” I nodded. 

A look of relief washed over Pete’s face. “Whew, I’m so glad, as soon as you said who you were I couldn’t believe I didn’t realize it sooner. I was afraid I’d lose you as a friend forever.”

“You still might… this is just a trial, okay? I wanna see if you are who I thought you were.”

“Alright, I get it. I’ll do my best to prove that I’m not a jerk.”

“You could always start by telling people the truth about why you hung out with me. That might help.”

He sighed, rotating his coffee cup on the table. “But nobody else at school knows I’m gay. It would be… a lot. It’s hard to just come out like that.”

“So? If I had to show up as a girl and then a cat-girl, you can be gay.”

He looked up from his mug, stunned for a moment, but quickly fading into a grin. He slipped into a chuckle out of nowhere, and I couldn’t help but join in. His laugh always got me.

“Guess you’re right… Okay, I’ll tell them.”

“Thanks, Pete,” I smiled. The first genuine smile he’d gotten from me since this whole thing started.

“I should probably get home and change… I’ve been out all night. I’m a mess,” I said, sighing.

“Yeah. You look like a mangy stray,” Pete teased gently. “Want me to walk with you?”

“Uh… Sure,” I nodded. “I’d like that.”

We both stood, and Pete left a few bucks on the table.

I was just about to step through the door when I heard someone shout, “Look out!”

I felt a hand grab my wrist and pull, hard. It just barely brought me back and out of the path of a speeding bike messenger.

A wave of nausea worse than anything I had ever felt swam through my body, and as I looked back to Pete, I could tell why.

He was standing there, holding my watch by the broken band. The next thing I saw was the warm honey-colored tiles rushing up to meet me.